


(i won't ever) trade my mistakes

by goldtitainium



Category: Marvel
Genre: Baby Peter Parker, Domestic Fluff, Family Fluff, Fluff, Kid Peter Parker, M/M, Painting, Superfamily, Superhusbands, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, bc we need it lbr, ig, toddler peter painting w steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-12 00:50:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18000671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldtitainium/pseuds/goldtitainium
Summary: Toddler Peter, painting a masterpiece with his dad.aka: a dumb amount of family fluff to help you power through the week





	(i won't ever) trade my mistakes

**Author's Note:**

> there's a scene in here that was very heavily inspired by Eight Grade (2018) and that movie has made me cry every single time i've seen it at the exact same point, so if you haven't seen it, i really urge you to check it out. it's made by the 'is there anything better than pussy... YES a really good book' vine guy if that helps.

Peter, for some reason, loved to be in Steve’s studio, not even with him, just playing on his mat with his blocks, Steve knew, despite, however, slightly, irrational it sounded, that Peter was probably safer with Tony, but he was in meetings to make up for the ones he’d missed/will be missing.  
So that was where he’s today, babbling under his breath, building and destroying block-towers as Steve talks back to him, about very nearly everything, and finishes off one of his paintings. 

Peter seemingly got bored of his blocks, knocking them over one last time, and clamours after his father’s attention in the only way most toddlers know how: yelling. 

“PAINT,” he declares, throwing his arms up, accidentally sending a couple blocks skidding across the floor.

Steve laughs, “Yeah, that’s what I’m doing right now, Pete,” he teases, but he washes up his brushes and sits across from Peter, tossing a block between his hands. 

Peter watches him and scoots forwards, patting his hand on Steve’s, giggling maniacally when the block falls out of his hands, and Steve never thought that it was possible to love as much he does Peter and Tony, and every time he sees them laughs or smile he’s reminded of just how lucky he is. He scoops Peter up in his arms and peppers his face with kisses, laughing as he does.

Eventually, Peter stops giggling and starts squirming to be set down. Steve kisses him on the forehead and lets him go, watching as he speed-crawls to his Box of Stuff, picks out a tube of child-friendly (non-toxic and edible, because their child was an absolute disaster of a tiny human, whose current first instinct is to put things in his mouth) paint and waves it at Steve frantically. 

Painting it is.

“Ok, bud,” Steve says, getting up to find paper or som, brushing his hands over Peter’s curly hair when he passes him picking out all of his paints. A huge canvas catches his eye, _why not._

He drags it over and lays it in front of Peter, who’s lined up his paint tubes in a vague rainbow, “Go crazy,” he says, sitting across from him again, leaning his elbows on his knees, after Peter looks up at him, slightly confused.

Peter, Steve and his husband’s, wonderful, beautiful, amazing son, uses all of his sense and previous life experience, to lift up a tube of red paint, bangs it on the canvas and then puts the corner of it in his mouth, chewing on it, looking up at Steve proudly.

Steve loves him so, so much. He laughs and drags him into his lap, turning him so he faces the canvas and guides his hands so he clicks opens the tube.  
Peter looks up at him, unsure for a second. “Whatever you want, Pete,” Steve says, kissing his head. Peter nods to himself, looking down at the paint, and then squeezes as hard as he can, moving his arms in circles, sending paint flying everywhere, mostly in one corner of the canvas.

Peter crawls out of Steve's lap and spreads the paint with his hands keeping it mostly on one corner, crawling over the canvas when he couldn’t reach the other side, getting red paint all over his Winnie the Pooh onesie.

Steve opens the rest of the tubes and sets them out when Peter’s done with the red, he picks up the blue next, squeezing out all of it next to the red and spreads it with his arms and hands. 

When some of the red mixes with the blue and makes purple, he’s absolutely mesmerised, swiping more blue into the red and looking up at Steve, proud and giggling every single time he does.

Steve’s never been prouder in his entire life.

After a while, Peter hands Steve the yellow and then holds his hands out expectantly. Steve raises his eyebrows, “You want something?” he teases.  
“Yellow,” Peter says, insistently, shoving his hands out more, “p’ease,” he adds, at Steve’s look.

“I guess so,” Steve relents, brushing his curly hair back, laughing when Peter squirms and hits his hands on Steve’s knees. 

When Peter finally gets the paint on his hands, he immediately slams his hands on the canvas, squealing excitedly when some of it made orange and some of it made green, looking up at Steve in amazement.

“Papa, papa!” Peter says, hitting Steve on his leg to get his attention, turning his jeans yellow, “Look!” he carries on, excitedly.  
“Yeah, Pete, you’re doing so well,” Steve says, not caring that the paint probably wasn’t going to come out, not even trying to hide the warmth in his voice, his heart exploding when Peter grins up at him, proud.

Peter carries on, talking to himself as he mixes and spreads paint around, Steve occasionally talking to him and agreeing with him, but mostly just letting him do what he wanted, watching as he puts green and purple at the top of the canvas and the bottom, puts red and yellow on one side and blue on another, swirling the colours.

Eventually, when he’s done, he crawls back into Steve’s lap and smears his hands over Steve’s face, cackling as he does.  
Steve laughs but doesn’t try to stop him, how could he when his and Tony’s son was laughing and looking at him like _that_?

“You’re meant to paint the canvas, not your papa,” Steve tries, because Tony accused him of letting Peter do pretty much whatever he wanted, despite everyone thinking that Tony would be the one to.

“Das daddy ‘n you ‘n y’ fightin’ th’ bad guys,” Peter says, pointing at different parts of his painting, snuggling into Steve, “‘cause y’guys a’ways beat ‘em,” he carries on, through a yawn.

“Yeah, we do, Pete, we do the dangerous stuff to keep you safe,” Steve replies softly, gently shifting him so he was cradled in his arms and getting up, rocking him gently when he sticks his thumb in his mouth.

Peter carries on babbling through yawns and around his thumb, clutching Steve’s shirt with his other hand, mumbling about Iron Man and Captain America.

“Yeah, you’re right Petey,” Steve says softly, walking over to the floor-to-ceiling windows that they’d found out that Peter loved looking out of them whenever he was falling asleep, “your dad’s pretty great.”

Peter agrees with him with a cheer and tries to snuggle closer and bury himself in Steve’s chest. “Yeah, he really is,” Steve says, looking down into Peter’s big, brown eyes, struck once again, by just how much he looks like Tony and how innocent and trusting he is, “he’s the best guy I know.”

“I thought Pete would’a taken over that spot by now,” Steve hears behind him, warmth and love spreading in his chest at an almost-definitely Pavlovian response to his husband’s voice.  
Steve turns around to face him, grin already forming, “You’re tied,” he says, as Peter waves his hands at Tony.

“Hey kiddo,” Tony says softly, coming up to them, running his hands through Peter’s hair and then leans up on his tiptoes to press a kiss to Steve’s cheek, “hey darling,” he says to Steve, just before he kisses him near-breathless, breaking up because Peter starts patting Tony on the head to get his attention.

“Yeah, Peter Pan?” Tony asks, still leaning into Steve.

“We painted!” He says happily, all thoughts of a nap abolished and attempting to sit up in Steve’s arms. He points over at the painting on the floor and they all move towards it.

“What did you paint Petey-pie?” Tony asks.

“‘S you ‘n papa fightin’ th’ baddies!” Peter says arms flailing wildly as he gestures to all of his painting. Tony takes in the painting and is suddenly overcome with so many emotions he barely knows how to deal with it. _His and his husband’s son made a painting of them, keeping the world, and most importantly, Peter safe._

“Steve,” he says, his voice cracking, turning in his arms to face both of them.

“Yeah, I know,” Steve says, smiling and kissing him, “you’re his hero, y’know. Mine too.”

“Steve,” Tony says, tears shining in his eyes, “you can’t just-- _god_ I love you, both of you, so, so much, it’s-- all of it, everything, was worth it, for this, for you and Peter.”

Steve wraps his arm around him, bringing him in and presses a kiss to his forehead, “Don’t think that for a second it isn’t the exact same for me,” he says.

Peter had no idea what’s going on but he’s warm and comfortable and maybe, possibly a little tired. A nap seems like a good idea.

* * *

Later, when they’ve put Peter to bed, in a new onesie, after reading him story after story, and they’re lying in their own bed, Steve kissing every single inch of Tony’s body, he realises, for maybe the millionth time that day, just how lucky he is.

* * *

Even later, years and years down the line, Peter asks Steve why he has modern art in their living room, when he’s made it very clear exactly what his opinions are of modern art.

“...I mean, that’s been there ever since I can remember,” Peter says, gesturing to a colourful mess of a painting, dated some 13 years back, “and you and dad don’t like modern art, so why’s it there?”

“It’s not modern art Peter Pan,” Steve says, sitting down next to him, “you made it.” 

“Why’s it up there though?” Peter asks, he knows that his dads have kept every single thing he’s ever made, but only this one is above the mantel, and he can’t understand why they’d keep something a baby made, especially when pops was an _artist._

“A long time ago, someone asked me, if I could go back in time and fix my mistakes, what I would fix, at the time, I couldn’t tell them, at the time, I’d made so many I didn’t know where to start, but the day you made that, I realised that everything I’d ever done led me here, with you and your dad, if the tiniest thing had changed, I might not be here, with either of you, and that’s not a world I want to live in. That painting reminds of that.” 

“And here I thought I was the sappy one, and I’m pretty sure that I asked you that,” someone says behind them.  
Over 20 years, more than two decades, and the feeling of happiness and love never faded when he heard Tony’s voice.

“Hey honey,” he says, tilting his head back, “how much did you hear?” He asks, sending dizzying deja vu through his mind. 

Tony grins, knowing exactly what he’s thinking of, “Enough,” he says softly, leaning over the back of the couch to kiss Peter on the head and then coming round to kiss Steve, sticking his tongue out at Peter when he made retching noises.

“Tony, dear, you’re the father,” Steve says, teasingly, wrapping an arm around him and kissing his forehead.

“Yeah, I am,” he says softly, looking at both of them.

“Yeah, you’re the sappy one,” Peter says, grinning.

“He's the one who hung your painting,” Tony protests, purely for the reason of saving face, knowing that neither of them were going to believe it.

“Because you can’t reach that high,” Steve quips back, grinning at Peter when he laughs and Tony whines that his family have turned on him, burrowing into Steve’s side and wrinkling his nose at Peter.

Peter glances at the clock and immediately stands up, “Fuck - sorry dad - I’m late for Ned.”

“Ok, Pete, call us when you get there,” Steve says, handing him his phone and his hoodie when he starts frantically patting down his pockets for it.

“Thanks pop, bye!” he calls behind him, practically running out.

They watch him go and Tony snuggles closer to Steve, pressing a kiss to his cheek, “You think we did ok with him,” he asks, tracing patterns over his thighs.

“I look at him, and, I see this incredible young man, that painting, when he made it, before that, when he was still so, new and tiny and breakable, I was so, so terrified that he wasn’t going to be okay, I knew that we’d both try our hardest, and that _you’d_ be the better one, from the very beginning, god, I was terrified that I’d mess it up and this little guy, who had such a future, wouldn’t get it because of some fucked up soldier from the past, but when he made it, seeing at him so happy and free, it’s the same day that I realised that, whatever he was going to do, he was going to be okay, and I stopped being scared,” Steve says, “and I think we did pretty good.”

Tony looks up at his husband, eyes shining, "Yeah, we did."

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading, any comments and kudos are greatly appreciated.  
> [tumblr post](https://nohalfway.tumblr.com/post/183223448621/i-wont-ever-trade-my-mistakes) of this fic  
> have a great week!!


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